When it comes to hiring people, it is essential to select those individuals who not only have the necessary skills for the job but also have the attitude and demeanor that make them a good fit for the company culture. However, hiring such employees is a demanding proposition and requires carefully conceived strategies for talent acquisition. Behavioral assessment and skill-based screenings are necessary to onboard premier talent. Explore the process in greater detail below.
Table of Contents
Understanding the Company’s Needs and Culture
To ensure placement of a successful employee within company, a recruiter must understand what the company expects in its notion of an ideal candidate. The requirements vary in every department and industry – a one-size-fits-all approach will not be effective. Accordingly, recruiters must formulate employee personas with must-haves and good-to-haves in the candidate pool highlighted for filling the role.
Hiring managers should also know what type of candidate would satisfy the best fit for the overall company culture. Failing to consider company culture can impact existing employees, recruitment advertising ROI, and employee retention.
Creating Detailed Job Descriptions
Generic job descriptions are sufficient for attracting a wide pool of talent. However, many generic candidates will be of no benefit to your team. Formulate detailed job descriptions delineating the skills, experience, qualifications, and job responsibilities necessary for success in the role. Additionally, be sure to highlight the benefits one can leverage after open enrollment communication and the salary range for the position. Detailed job descriptions set immediate expectations and attract top talent, yielding benefits for both recruiters and candidates.
Leveraging Multiple Recruitment Channels
Creating a job post on LinkedIn, or any singular channel, is no longer a viable path to success. Your ideal candidates could be searching for jobs on a multitude of platforms. As such, it is highly advised that recruiters leverage multiple job posting platforms as part of a comprehensive talent acquisition strategy. Managing responses across channels can pose an administrative challenge, but the more qualified responses, the better for your team in the long run.
Hosting a “Careers” page on an official company website is also advisable. It serves multiple benefits, including employer branding, while serving as an additional recruitment channel.
Parsing Resumes Efficiently
Recruiters often receive hundreds of applications in order to fill a position. Manually parsing every application impacts the productivity and efficiency of internal recruiting teams. Staffing firms frequently rely on sophisticated resume parsing technology in order to optimize both time and effort. In that manner, recruiters can push more qualified candidates into the hiring pipeline, increasing volume without compromising quality.
Skill-Based Screening
Experience and qualification do not guarantee skills. A skill-based assessment of candidates is critically important. Recruiters might ask existing employees of the company to create customized assessments, or they can leverage third-party platforms for the same purpose. Ensure that testing material is not generic and that it tests a candidate’s skills on different levels. Merely testing the candidates is not enough; recruiters should base their hiring decisions on the results. The results of such assessments may also help companies create future training programs to bridge knowledge gaps after hiring.
Behavioral Assessment
Assessing behaviors is a crucial part of the hiring process. Recruiters should include more questions that uncover a candidate’s aspirations, goals, and behavior within the workplace. Predictable questions yield rehearsed answers and should be avoided. Behavioral assessments help companies hire people with the right attitudes to avoid instances potentially leading to the workplace investigation process and other complex processes.
Staying Connected with Candidates
Remember: other companies are also looking for top talent. Recruiters must stay connected to the candidates during the hiring process at every stage; otherwise, a company could lose an ideal candidate and be forced to repeat the process.
Even when a candidate is not selected, let them know politely and provide feedback for future improvements. This creates an immediate positive impact on the candidate, and lays the groundwork for a possible referral network.
Asking for References
When hiring for management roles, recruiters must necessarily check on their references. If necessary, they can ask old colleagues or mutual contacts who have worked with the candidate. Taking this extra step before onboarding can help companies secure the best talent from the top down.
Conclusion
Onboarding the right candidate can benefit an organization in myriad ways in the long run. Companies can educate their hiring managers or leverage a staffing agency Pittsburgh.
